Money vs Karma

Our culture often misquotes the bible when we talk about “Money is the root of all evil.” The actual quote from the bible which is something attributed to Jesus was that, “The love of money (Greed) is the root of all evil.” (1 Timothy 6:10, KJV). Our culture has also picked up the word karma and made it a concept understood by many that what goes around comes around. Even though the Indian religion concept of karma is at odds with most Westerns religions; “faith, or the will of God vs the cycle of actions and past lives,” I am going to try to talk about this subject from the conceptual point of view rather than doctrines.

“Karma is a b!tch” is a phrase often used by people that seem to misunderstand the whole concept, it always makes me chuckle a little inside. I don’t think that many in the western world understand the concept enough to really use a motivator. The golden rule concept has the same flavor and its more in line with our society, but not many people truly live it. I will always be impressed by Christians that really “walk the walk” and love everyone, not just who their congregation sees as righteous people of God.

Bea and I come from Colombia; even though we would love for people to know more about our country, its hard to gloss over its history of violence and corruption. The biggest motivator for a lot of the horrible things that have happened in our country have been motivated by money. From the Banana Massacre to Pablo Escobar, evil was definitely rooted directly in greed. I even question myself for posting about such horrible things, but I don’t want to gloss over the reality that a lot of atrocities have occurred in my homeland because of greed.

Most atheist that I have talked to don’t believe in the afterlife, so karma in the sense of a next life is automatically out the window. However, this does not make them amoral or unethical people. Most of the people that I know that don’t believe in a higher being are highly compassionate and overall good human beings. Their belief system is rooted in the today and many follow the golden rule.

Many believes do believe in the beyond and some even see this existence as punishment or a just the waiting room to heaven. Their actions or their faith will open up that door to either eternal damnation or paradise.

My questions is simple. When it comes to money being the motivator for an action that affects other human beings, (from killing someone, to simply stealing millions from the stock market) do you think anyone goes back to their belief system to weight karma or faith out? Do you think that money is the ultimate motivator and enough of it will just make you put what you believe aside? Or what if as some people see it you are an atheist and you believe in “nothing” does that make it easier for you to be motivated by money?

5 comments on “Money vs Karma”

Curious. It would seem that someone with a faith backing would at least at the bare minimum have an internal check. Now, they may choose to ignore it and have money rule over them but the question is at least there.

Now, it would seem that someone without that would not have that check but the problem is that no matter what the person believes today, they still had some sort of upbringing from their parents. If they were not taught any morality then it would seem there would be no check.

That is probably the biggest issue Mark. Everyone assumes that morality works like it did for them. You get your morality from your parents (based on your statement.) while a lot of people don’t.

I made my own set of morals as I was growing up, and I get older they diverge more and more from what I was taught by religion.

One simple stance for example. I am for homosexual marriage and specially for homosexual parents right to adoption. That goes completely against the morality that was taught by upbringing in the sense that gays and lesbians were immoral, however I don’t believe that any longer. Just that belief makes me not a “true” Catholic or Christian in many people’s eyes. It would even make me immoral in some of their eyes… even if my belief is all about respecting people’s choices and helping the community by placing as many kids as possible in what I consider good homes.

As an atheist, I do not believe in gods, afterlifes, karma or any other supernatural phenomena. I think it’s a random, chaotic universe where sometimes, bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people. Things don’t “always happen for a reason”, there is no purpose for us being here and there is no divine plan for your life, this world or anything else.

And it is because we are on our own that we have to figure out how to get along in the world. No one is going to save us or rescue us from ourselves.

I live by a very simple code. Here it is. “Don’t be a dick”.

I live by this code not because I believe in divine retribution, but because it has a very real and demonstratable effect. It makes my life easier and happier.

Look, you don’t need supernatural forces to develop a moral compass.

Imagine a tribe of primitive hominids before they evolved the ability to speak. Let’s say one of these hominids decides he doesn’t want to hunt and gather. He’d rather wait until the hunters and gatherers returned and just take their stuff from them.

So all the other hominids pick up their rocks and sticks and beat him senseless.

They just developed a moral code. Thou shalt not steal because bad things will happen to you if you steal.

That doesn’t require faith or commandments carved in stone or an afterlife where justice is administered.

It only requires the simple demonstratable concept that cooperation and compassion is a better survival strategy than beligerence and hostility.

I disagree with your opening statement Mark. Faith does not equate to morality. In an ideal world it would, but many “people of faith” act in ways that do not meet my definition of morality.

That aside, money can really dent or break somebody’s idea of their own morality/ethics. I think a lot of people behave ethically (I like that term better than morality in this case) in regards to other peoples money because of the consequences of not doing so. Take away a fear of negative consequences and I think more people would act in a greedy & selfish manner.

Notice I said more, not all. Some people really do live up to the ideal that we are all here to care for each other, and act accordingly in every facet in their life. And Log, I don’t think it has to do with religion, at least not solely.

the love of money is the root of some evil but not all evil i think. there’s evil for evil’s sake. do unto others like you would like to be treated. and what goes around does come around you can believe that.